Old Fashioned Loveliness

It's been a long weekend here in Victoria for Labour Day - After the usual chores of cleaning ect and after getting a longish walk in on Saturday to make up for having done little walking or running during the week, I decided to settle down to some  stitching of various kinds ....... worked on some knitting, worked on the hexie tablecloth which I will share in a separate post and I was finally able to get to work on the woodland tablerunner stitchery.  The hexie section was made a year ago and has sat until the pattern was able to be purchased without doing a class ...... I decided to use some of these lovely little felt pieces I had which are

working so well for the mushrooms and hearts!  I've started on one end and quite happy with how its coming along.  It's been a long time since I sat and did some embroidery and I found it quite relaxing and it made the weekend seem to slow into an old fashioned simplicity

We heard news of an antique shop closing down in Benalla, which I knew had a number of those lovely old fashioned lamps we love - she agreed to open the shop especially for Pete and I to head over for a visit on Saturday ........ it was worth her while!   Pete was excited by the types of lamps she had there from an old

estate ...... ones I'd been trying to tell him about, but its never the same until you see things in their splendour ........ we came home with 7 Old Fashioned pieces of Loveliness that will eventually be finding homes in the rooms of our old queenslander home up North.  The white is milk glass.  With these additions that should take care of lamps for a very long time!






  Two are large double burners that stand quite tall.  I think we definitely have a lamp for every room now!

Koi Fish for the bases

I also found a lovely wooden blanket stand that just had to come back home with me as well - I

plan on having it in our bedroom up north.  Unfortunately you get to see my ironing pile and any number of other bits sitting in the current sewing/crafting space of this house ......  WIP that need more emphasis on the "Work" bit of it lol  I'm missing not having the extra bits of furniture to be able to put things away in, but when we sent them all north back in June last year I hadn't anticipated how much more stuff we might accumulate between then and whenever we do end up selling!!   There are things jammed everywhere as you can see from the white cupboard below!!

 Before I finish here you get one last photo of the lamps, since Pete enjoyed putting them all into a line I just couldn't not get a photo of that!  Have a great week everyone, Hugs Sharm

 

Farewell February

I'm finding hard to believe that not only has another month gone by, but with the close of February comes the official close of summer down here! Not only is Feb my Blog anniversary month, it's also my wedding anniversary - Pete and I celebrated 33yrs of marriage this year.  With things as they are, we didn't get to go away - but Pete took me out to dinner to a lovely little Italian restaurant in Yarrawonga which was very nice! No photos taken unfortunately - but we did give each other some lovely little gifties!  With all the fishing Pete has been doing, I figured it was about time he had a decent filleting knife and ended up finding a lovely tinned set for him which also had a lure as well.

  I received the most wonderful lamp with a pink base (we don't have any pink bases) with a lovely decorated glass ......... and knowing how much I love fancy wrought iron - he found a lovely key holder which I've put aside for the new house! 

 What perfect gifts for each other!  Pete even got to try out the knife a couple of days later when he caught a couple of cod - this big one was released back in, but a smaller legal size was kept and turned into fillets for me to cook up.

85cm Murray River Cod

 
OPAM 2018 is now underway and I have 4 finishes the months of January and February!  Thanks to Kris and Peg who continue to keep this going. As you can see they were all fibre related even though we were in the midst of Summer!  Cotton yarn is great to work with in hot weather and all but the blanket were made using the cotton.  The blanket is the one made for a work colleague who is expecting her first baby.  I plan to share the pattern here on the blog sometime soon - it's quite easy, but I was pleased with how effective the pattern is.  It's also nice to have a few items finished as we get into the year!

 Before February came to a close I also managed to walk/run my way virtually to Sydney!  I think I've previously mentioned that when I decided I was going to take this learning to run thing seriously back in October last year - I joined up with Run Down Under which gives you a virtual map of Australia showing just where you are.  Everyone starts in Canberra and runs/walks their way around Australia (using the free Strava running app, it automatically syncs to RDU).  I find it fun and encouraging.  Another friend was also due to "run into Sydney" the same time as

me - so we co ordinated our times and phoned each other so we could chat over the mobiles while we walked the last couple of kms into Sydney!  It was a bit of fun which really added to what could have been just another boring walk!   I've realised how important it is to ensure I keep up / increase my fitness and muscle tone as I'm in my mid 50's and it's very easy to loose bone density, fitness, and endurance for even everyday things!  At some point I hope I'll have a nice selection of active things that I can participate in and enjoy that also help keep me healthy!
Of course all good fitness routines need to have balance...... so lucky I have all that fibre and material to keep me balanced!! lol
With the beginning of March, I joined in with lots of other ladies

from around the world for Friday Night With Friends  .......  I felt like I needed something else to go with the baby blanket, so decided to knit up a little beanie.  I started on it last night and finished it off this morning.  It's one of Woolly Wormheads called Beamish.  I'll be making a slightly larger one as well as her partner has a little boy who spends part of the time with them and I don't want him to feel left out.  Emma tells me his favourite colour is yellow, yellow and yellow ...... I guess his will be yellow lol.  I do love the little top of this beanie and I very nearly did the top in a green to kind of resemble a pumpkin - but then thought better of it - not

everyone likes that sort of thing.
I'm afraid I have quite a few things sitting on my needles ...... and a number of WIP material and stitching wise that also need attention........  I just seem to be jumping from one project to another to another so far this year .......

Well, it must be time to sit with a cuppa and contemplate what's next on my agenda for today ..... yes, yes, the house has been cleaned, washing done and on the line drying, went to Corowa this morning with hubbie who was swapping a boat propeller over whilst I did the groceries ...... finished

off the above little beanie and actually got this post written up!  We have been letting Cliff (the rainbow lorikeet now 17yrs old that was originally our son's when he was 15, but left him with us when he moved out and couldn't take him to where he was living, then got married and had babies who we wanted to keep all 10 fingers and toes intact) - Anyhooooo - this very crazy bird who enjoys ripping out his feathers and loves his cage - has finally been adventurous ..... right now I found him up in the tree out the back calling out for a treat thankyou very much!!

I don't know about you, but I'm off to make that coffee I mentioned earlier ......... and some sort of stitching ...... or perhaps a book  hmmmmmm

Wonderful Weekend

What a great weekend its been - a little short perhaps, but you get that .... I got distracted from doing much work on the knitted shawl Friday night as Pete suggested we head into town for a pizza and we sat out and a couple of drinks while we waited - a nice distraction to the ordinary ...... Saturday morning and we headed out with the boat (and Scruffy) ..... down to Lake Nillacootie which is between Benalla and the turn off to Mansfield. 
 We spent a few hours out on the water fishing and enjoying the time out! 

Naturally you need to see the fish I caught!

And yes, I did catch a fish - a bass which unfortunately was 2cm too short to be a keeper which saddened me a little ........  Scruffy seemed to enjoy himself, although he did spend quite a bit of time sleeping lol  It was just sooooo relaxing .  I won't bore you with a whole lot of photos from the day out ......

Pete sitting back while Scruffy and I were walking around the banks

Earlier in the week I did manage to finish crocheting that baby blanket I told you about last post.  It's a design I made up and will share here later in the year. I'm really happy with the design and although it took a few different goes before I found a binding I was happy with, I think it's come up well.

 This morning it was market day ...... this time the bus "Seriously Crazy" from Charters Towers was back again ...... I just couldn't resist ..........  I think these will end up making a nice table runner.  The Bee theme is based on what was my little sewing cabins name "The Beehive" which you might

remember (until it all had to be packed up ....... mostly into boxes now in Qld and a few remains kept out and moved back inside to one of the bedrooms.  I've always had a bit of a thing for bees, but not gotten into collections or bee keeping as such .........  I do enjoy watching various bits of nature, which is why I try to have lots of flowers and shrubbery together with watering "holes" to keep the good insects happy and have the little birds visiting.
Did I mention I finally found some material I was happy with to be the background for the signature hexie tablecloth??  Well I decided this fabric with little hexie shapes would work.  I've kind of attached the hexies to it ...... but I have a bit of quilting work to do on it ....... and might also add some other bits to it before it gets its binding
 

I managed to get some more walking and a bit of running done during the week with a walk in Yarrawonga finishing just in time to catch the Queens Baton coming through town on its way up to the Gold Coast for the Games later in the year!

 

I hope everyone has had a wonderful weekend and your week goes well.

Hugs, Sharm

 

On Lake Nillacootie in the back section

Getting into it .........

Now in the second month of the year I have this feeling of it flitting through my fingers if I'm not

mindful ........   OPAM  has opened once again. I think I first joined in on it back in 2010, with just a couple of breaks (where I no doubt missed the sign up, since I seem to miss things like that from time to time) - Mostly my finished items are knitted or crocheted with a few sewn items here and there - its not a competition as such, but more a gentle way of helping you to keep moving along on your projects, but not forgetting just how many you have managed to achieve.  Naturally some things are quick to finish like a mug rug - while others like my WIP "Down the rabbit hole quilt" are taking more than a year in the making!!! I have a page set aside just for my OPAM now, rather than using the sidebar which I used

to erase when the new one started! Both Kris and Peg look after OPAM and have it open for sign ups till the end of Feb!  I've finished off another little cotton crocheted bag - another new design as I wanted something light, small easy to pop across your body but big enough to hold my phone and a pair of glasses - since they seem to be my constant companion these days lol .....
 I'm  also working hard on getting a baby blanket crocheted up for a gift for one of the girls in my team who will be leaving in a few weeks time.  Hope to have it finished this week..........  The summer shawl has been set aside for me to work on this, but hoping to finish off the shawl sometime during the month.

Pete was away again this weekend - off fishing/ camping with blokes from the fishing club here at Bundalong.  He's been having a great time the past few months with so many times away camping and fishing (males only). He managed to catch another Cod this weekend that was a keeper, so the freezer has quite a stash of fish in it at present!  With Pete having had 3 or 4 weekends the last part of last year and 3 out of 6 weekends away so far this year ....... I'm struggling with some green eyes and a spirit that is dying to be able to head off somewhere ......... just wish I could actually plan something in advance, but alas with not knowing just when we will be making the big move, its hard to make plans!!

Every 2nd year I enjoy a particular book that I tend to like reading over the summer months for some strange reason ........ "A Town Like Alice" by Neville Shute.  It's quite an older book now, my copy is falling apart - and is currently packed in a box 2 states away lol .... the story is based on a little bit of reality that occurred during the war.  I finally decided I needed to borrow it from the library  and started reading it last night in bed -  its amazing how a good book can transport you into such a good state of mind and body isn't it.  Of course this book was also made into a movie - one of these days I should try and get hold of it on DVD so I can watch it again!   There never seems to be enough hours in the day for everything we need and would like to do is there? I've got quite a list of things that need doing - like using up the 20 litres of olive oil I have waiting to be made into soap.  Its really only good for making soap with and I know it wont be allowed on the truck when we move, so it needs to be transformed into something that can be used or easily transported!

Early morning around 6ish when I go out before work for a short walk/run

The 2 Bridges Walk

I really tried to do this post last week - unfortunately no matter what I tried the photos just would not

download to google or to the laptop and my ipad wouldn't allow me to write a new post ....... it seems to be happening a lot lately which is very frustrating!
  Anyhooooooo ...... last Saturday I decided I would finally head into Yarrawonga and walk the 2 bridges which go over the Murray River from Yarrawonga on the Victorian side (our closest local town 17kms from here) to Mulwala which is on the NSW side.  I thought perhaps you might like to join me as we leave the car in the shopping area and head down the road towards the caravan park

 ready for the 1st bridge which goes over the weir wall 

 I've often wanted to walk over these bridges, but just never gotten around to actually doing it. So here we are as we move onto the bridge and look down below .....

They let out a certain amount of water to head downstream to other towns depending on how much is in the weirs further upstream, or what flooding is going on ....

Here you can see the river behind me flowing downstream ......

 From here we head around the road and past the back and then the front of the RSL club 

which is just before we start over the old bridge ....  What a glorious start to the day it was looking out over the water. 

This old bridge is a real mixture as both states began building from there respective sides with designs of their own and didn't quite get the figures right ...... which meant the bridge has a bend in it where they had to make a curve to get them to meet......

I really wanted to do a 10km walk and apparently doing the 2 bridges is only around 3 ....... so you'll see we then walk along the foreshore ....... which changes from fun and games

 Funnily enough, this is where you actually find seagulls hanging around ....... yep, no salt water within a few hundred miles but they know where to find chips lol

  to a more natural space ........... and look what was hiding there ...... We get quite a lot of black swans around here as well as the pelicans and sea gulls and any number of other birds!

 Lets continue on up to the  very small yacht club where I caught a glimpse of one of the dragon boats heading out  .......... I missed getting a good photo of it, but this was docked up just beside them ...

 then up to Chinamans Island which is a very natural type habitat .

 

Unfortunately the other photo won't download ......... hmmmmm 

.......... finally tracing my steps back along the foreshore and through the main street with all the shops .... plus an extra block to finally make the 10kms I was hoping for.  I do hope you enjoyed the walk as much as I did.  Perhaps in the next couple of days my other photos from this weekend will have downloaded to allow me to post.

Jan Close- Feb Begins

The skies around here have been throwing out some magical colours with sunsets and sunrises - Pete

Sultana Grapes from our Vine.

took this one on his way to work the other day! (unfortunately, the photo just wont download - so maybe next time!).  January seems to have come and gone - its one of those months that begin with holiday and wind down mode, venturing into planning mode and it seems just as you feel ready to begin the New Year, its the last week of January ...... or the first week of February!  I'd meant to write a couple of posts by now, but time has a way of slipping through your fingers before you realise.  I've spent January working on a pattern for a cotton crocheted

market bag which I finished ....... and took to the farmers market last weekend to try it out.  I was really pleased with what I could fit into it (the slightly different shaped base), and the shoulder strap worked like a charm (no cutting into the shoulder with added weight in the bag).  I also like that its all one piece with just the one join which is crocheted anyhow giving extra strength to it.

  I prefer to work with cotton yarn during the height of summer as my fingers don't get sweaty like they do if I work with wool.  I decided to use some cotton I recently purchased and add some stash yarn to it to make one of Laura Aylors shawl patterns - mine will be a summer shawl (hopefully to use on a beach somewhere before too long!)  So this was what I worked on Friday night when I joined in with all the girls taking part in FNWF.  It's a free pattern called Touchstone and Laura now goes by Fogbound Knits if you are looking for her patterns.

 

I thought I'd finish here by showing this gum tree from our back yard (which I may have shown you

before)...... it's been slowly dying the past year although we made several attempts to save it - at one stage we thought we had as a branch of new growth came out looking healthy and strong, but then it started dying off as well.  Several breeds of birds still seem to be very fond of it, although they don't get to hide in the leaves quite like they used to be able to ........

Tomorrow is my Blog Anniversary - it will be 8 years since I started Country Fragrance ......